Some time after the first film, Mavis (Selena Gomez) and her new fiancé Johnny (Andy Samberg) are finally married, with the approval of her father Dracula (Adam Sandler), and the world becomes aware of (and unfazed by) the existence of monsters. Mavis later reveals to Drac that she is pregnant and a year later, she gives birth to a baby boy named Dennis (Asher Blinkoff), who later befriends Wayne’s daughter Winnie (Sadie Sandler). Nearing his fifth birthday, Dennis has yet to grow his fangs and Drac worries that his grandson might not gain vampire powers. Noticing the dangers of Transylvania, Mavis starts to consider raising Dennis where Johnny grew up, much to Drac’s disapproval.

Drac tells Johnny (who doesn’t want to leave the hotel either) to bring Mavis to California to visit the in-laws, Mike (Nick Offerman) and Linda (Megan Mullally), but to make sure to keep her distracted so that she will not move, leaving Drac to “babysit” Dennis. Drac enlists his friends, Frank (Kevin James), Wayne the Werewolf (Steve Buscemi), Griffin the Invisible Man (David Spade), Murray the Mummy (Keegan-Michael Key) and Blobby the Blob (Jonny Solomon) to help train Dennis to become a monster, to no avail. Drac takes Dennis to his childhood summer camp, Camp Winnepacaca, where he learned to hone his vampire abilities, and discovers that the camp is safer than it was when he went there. Drac stubbornly believes Dennis is a “late fanger”, so he hurls Dennis from a tall, unstable tower to pressure the boy’s transformation into a bat. Dennis does not transform, and Drac has to fly and rescue him at the last second. The stunt is filmed by the campers and uploaded to the internet, which eventually reaches Mavis and Johnny. Mavis angrily transforms into a bat to fly her and Johnny back to Transylvania. Drac and his friends reach the hotel a couple of seconds after Mavis. She confronts her father for putting Dennis in grave danger and his inability to accept that he is human. She states she will move out of the hotel after Dennis’ fifth birthday the following Wednesday. Drac hangs his head with deep guilt.

Mavis invites Vlad (Mel Brooks), her grandfather and Drac’s father, to Dennis’ birthday party. As Vlad is much worse than he was when it comes to humans, Drac tells Johnny to have the human party-goers disguise themselves as monsters. Vlad receives the invitation and arrives with his monstrous bat-like servant Bela (Rob Riggle) to meet his great-grandson for the first time. Meeting him, he believes that fear will cause Dennis’ fangs to sprout and possesses a stage performer dressed as Dennis’s favorite television monster, “Kakie the Cake Monster,” to scare Dennis, but Drac shields his grandson at the last moment and exposes the deception to Vlad, who is outraged that Drac has accepted humans as guests in his hotel. Drac confronts his father about how humans are different now.

Mavis becomes upset with her grandfather’s behavior (regretting inviting him to Dennis’s birthday party) and while the family argues, Dennis sadly flees the hotel (followed by Bela) and enters the forest with Winnie in tow, hiding in her treehouse, but they are attacked by Bela, who mistakes Dennis for a human. When Bela injures Winnie and threatens to destroy the hotel, Dennis’ anger causes him to instantly grow his fangs and his vampire abilities manifest. He begins to fight Bela, who calls his giant-bat minions. Drac, Mavis, Dennis, Johnny, the rest of the monsters and (some of) Johnny’s family team up to defeat his minions as Vlad watches. A livid Bela then attempts to kill Johnny himself with a stake, but Vlad appears and shrinks him to a harmless size telling him never to come near him and his family again. This allows the Werewolf Kids to lick him nonstop.

With Dennis having vampire abilities, Mavis and Johnny continue to raise him in Transylvania, and they resume the party with his friends

REVIEW:

Adam Sandler’s movies haven’t been doing very well lately, with the exception of Hotel Transylvania(which he only has a voice acting part in). The first film was somewhat of a surprise hit which, of course, means there has to be Hotel Transylvania 2, right? I’m so sick of sequels, prequels, threequels, etc., but I digress. I’m sure this will be worth my time, right?

What is this about?

In this batty animated sequel, high jinks and hilarity ensue when Vlad, Dracula’s cranky estranged dad, arrives at Hotel Transylvania for an unexpected visit — and promptly creates an uproar.

What did I like?

Hanging with the guys. As with almost all of Adam Sandler’s movies, he makes sure to cast his buddies. This is no exception, but the difference is we get to see them actually act as if they are lifelong friends. The last time we saw that from Sandler and co. may have been Grown Ups.

Vlad. Let’s see, Dracula is Jewish comedic legend (whether we want to admit it or not), so his father would have to be an even bigger Jewish comedic legend. How about Mel Brooks? Yes, they cast Brooks as Vlad and he does not disappoint. First, he shows why he has been in the funny business all these years by having a comedic standoff with Sandler and then, we see the grumpy, human hating, all powerful father of vampires. In the short time he is on screen, we get a nice layering of the character that really pays off the build up they gave him early on in the film.

Parks and Rec. The human parents are total opposite of Dracula. Serious and non-flinching, they make you wonder how they even had their son, who doesn’t seem to fit in with them, either. Nick Offerman and Megan Mullaly reunite (after many episodes avoiding each other on Parks and Recreation) and give us the tranquil ripples in this maelstrom of madness.

What didn’t I like?

Like father, like son. In the first film, I was not a fan of Andy Samberg’s character. This annoying human who somehow stumbled into a monster hotel nearly ruined the entire film for me. His son, while not as annoying, seems to have the same effect in the sequel. This kid is nothing more than a mop of bright orange hair that always needs saving and talk in such a way that we’re supposed to think him cute. I didn’t.

Tentacle monster. With all the monsters at the hotel, you would think we wouldn’t hear/see about any others, right? Well, lo and behold, out of nowhere (and in a normal, human neighborhood, mind you) we come across a tentacle monster that is married to a human woman, but everyone goes about their business as if nothing happened. How is this thing just up and running around town? I just don’t get it!

Worry too much. Mavis is a great character…at least she was in the first film. There was development, depth, and a touch of human to her that we all could relate to. This go around, she has been reduced to having nothing else to do but worry about her kid. I understand that is what mother’s do, but seriously, they could have given her something…anything else besides spending all her undead life doing things for her annoying kid…and don’t get me started on that little freak out over the camp video!

Final verdict on Hotel Transylvania 2? This is a valiant attempt to recreate the magic of the first film. IT actually comes quite close, but the failure here comes when the writers decided to use more kid humor or more adult humor, rather than finding a happy medium that all could enjoy. That being said, this is still a highly enjoyable film and better than most pictures out there. Do I recommend it? Yes, I do.

Dracula (Adam Sandler) is the owner and creator of Hotel Transylvania, a five-star resort where the world’s monsters can be safe from human civilization. Dracula invites some of the most famous monsters like Frankenstein (Kevin James) and his wife Eunice (Fran Drescher), Murray the Mummy (Cee Lo Green), Wayne and Wanda Werewolf (Steve Buscemi and Molly Shannon), Griffin the Invisible Man (David Spade), Bigfoot, Steve the Blob, and other monsters to celebrate the 118th birthday of his daughter Mavis (Selena Gomez). However, Mavis prefers to explore the outside world with her father’s permission, but the village he directs her to is actually an elaborate deception to convince her of the threat of humans enough to coax her back.

However, this charade inadvertently attracts the attention of an ordinary young traveler named Jonathan (Andy Samberg) who was exploring the surrounding forest and followed the staff to the hotel. Once Jonathan enters the hotel, Dracula frantically attempts to hide him from the patrons such as disguising him as a Flesh Golem named Johnny-stein with the later hasty cover story of being a relative of one of Frank’s body parts. Eventually, Jonathan is discovered by Mavis and company, forcing Dracula to claim he is going to arrange Mavis’ birthday party with a young perspective. In doing so, Jonathan manages to charm everyone at the hotel, especially Mavis. Eventually, even Dracula begins to like the human taking him into his confidence about his family’s traumatic past after the vampire notices the young man knows something about them in a respectful manner.

Unfortunately, Chef Quasimodo Wilson (Jon Lovitz) realizes Jonathan is human and captures him to cook him, forcing Dracula to directly intervene by magically freezing the chef. Eventually, the birthday party happens and it is a raucous success until Dracula freaks out when Mavis and Jonathan have an innocent kiss. A ranting Dracula accidentally lets it slip that he tricked Mavis at the fake village and Mavis is outraged at being manipulated by her own father. Things get worse when a still-frozen Chef Quasimodo interrupts the party as the Fly (Chris Parnell) translates his frozen language to the clientele which states that Jonathan is actually a human. Even as the clientele are revolted, Mavis still accepts and expresses her desire to be with Jonathan even though he is human. For his part, Jonathan feels obliged to reject Mavis for her father’s sake and leaves the hotel. Afterward, Dracula realizes that in his efforts to protect Mavis, he has broken her heart and now she tearfully wants to stay at the hotel forever.

Wishing to undo his mistake, Dracula persuades his friends to help him find Jonathan and even risks his destruction by venturing out in the daylight to do so. Learning that Jonathan is about to board a flight out of Transylvania Airport shortly, they race on and enter a town en route. At that town, Dracula and company are stunned to see the humans having a ‘Monster Festival’. To clear a path, Frankenstein tries to scare them, but finds the humans are cheerfully welcoming them instead and even provide a shaded route through the town for Dracula to proceed at maximum speed.

However, Dracula finds that he is too late with Jonathan’s plane taking off. With no alternative, Dracula desperately flies after it in broad daylight despite being hurt by the sun. With much effort, Dracula manages to reach the plane and resorts to mind-controlling one of the pilots (Brian Stack) to apologize and tell Jonathan that he wants him to return to be with his daughter. Jonathan accepts Dracula’s apology and Dracula manipulates the plane back to the airport.

Later, Dracula returns Jonathan to Mavis, who tells her that she’s his ‘zing’ and the reason why he had to reject her. Dracula gives his blessing to their relationship, Jonathan and Mavis kiss and the hotel has another party to celebrate his daughter’s liberating coming of age before Jonathan and Mavis set off on their travels.

The film ends with Dracula and his friends being shown in traditional animation (in the style of Genndy Tartakovsky’s cartoons) during the credits

REVIEW:

Given the bad rap monsters, especially vampires, werewolves and, to a lesser extent, zombies seem to be getting these days, it is nice to know that someone out there knows and respects their legacies enough to given them a film that isn’t insulting to everything we know about them. Sure, Hotel Transylvania may be a kids film, but there are no sparkling vampires who somehow manage to survive in the daylight here, nor are there any werewolves who do nothing but stalk unattractive emo chicks.

The gang’s all here. Pick a monster, any monster, and you’re sure to see them in the film, whether it be in a cameo or major role. I think the only ones missing were the more mythological creatures like minotaurs, centaurs, harpies, and the like, but there is a cyclops and a hydra to make up or fill the void.

Father knows best. For years, Adam Sandler has been trying to do a sensitive dad role and also use that voice he does in all of his films. Finally, all that practice has paid off! Sandler is such an animated person that it takes him being animated to get a truly great performance from him. Ironically, with the exception of that 9/11 dram he did, this is the most subdued character he’s played. That’s a good thing, as I think an insane acting man-child version of Dracula wouldn’t have gone over as well with the audience or with a “teenage” daughter. The relationship with his daughter is the heart of this film. If that didn’t work, then this flick wouldn’t have any legs to stand on.

Animation. Back when Cartoon Network was actually worth watching cartoon on, they had shows like Samurai Jack, Dexter’s Laboratory, and The Powerpuff Girls. All of these were done by the director of this film, Genndy Tartakovsky. I never really noticed it until the final credits were rolling, but the characters do have the design of one of his cartoons. Man, I miss his style of animation. Not to mention cartoons that were actually fun to watch, not just odd.

Dracula. As I mentioned before, Adam Sandler surprisingly gives a really good performance, but what is more impressive is the character design. Most iterations of Dracula are that of a tall, slender man with an imposing presence, not to mention his ability to bend the will the regular human and turn into a bat. The whole moving tables around and freezing people is new, but I like it.

What didn’t I like?

Kids. The kids annoyed the hell out of me. Mavis is fine, she’s just a teenage girl trapped in a castle wanting to get out and see the world. It happens. However, the wolf kids are representative of how unruly and disrespectful children are today. Johnny annoyed me in every way imaginable. First of all, he’s voiced by that no talent hack Andy Samberg, who is nothing more than an Adam Sandler wannabe and is a big reason Saturday Night Live hasn’t been funny for the past few years. This character though just seems to think his way is right, which it isn’t. The way he just walks in to the hotel just wasn’t a good introduction to him and he never recovered in my eyes.

Humans. Aside from John, we have the humans at the monster festival. Now, there is nothing specifically wrong with these people. It is basically just a comic con for people who like monsters. However, the fact that they have little to no reaction to Dracula and his pals is a little disconcerting. On the one hand, they are at a convention where everyone is dressed as monsters, so there is that little bit of disbelief expected. However, on the other hand, these are the real deal! Have we become that disenfranchised and dead to these guys that they are akin to stuffed animals? It sure seems like it. Such a shame, really.

Hotel Transylvania is one of the films that I really wanted to see when it came out, but because of scheduling, I never got around to it. I really do wish I had gotten to see this in theaters. I may have even paid the 3D price. This, along with ParaNorman and from the looks of it Frankenweenie (which I will be getting to soon) could make for some good Halloween movies for kids. Something that we haven’t really had in quite some time. I highly recommend this as it is truly an enjoyable film for everyone. Be on the lookout for the jab at Twilight late in flick. On a final note, does anyone know where it is that we all starting assuming Dracula said, “bleh, bleh”?

In an alternate 1899, an attack on the Bank of England in London is committed by a group of men who appear to be German soldiers using advanced explosives and automatic weapons, and even the first ever tank. This is followed by an attack on a German Zeppelin factory in Berlin by the same men, this time dressed as British soldiers, that leads Europe to the brink of war. An emissary of the British government, Sanderson Reed (Tom Goodman-Hill), arrives in a gentlemen’s club in British East Africa hoping to recruit the legendary, but now aged, hunter and adventurer Allan Quatermain (Sean Connery) to investigate the situation. Though Quatermain’s sense of patriotism has waned (because of his last adventures for the Empire cost the lives of many of his friends and lovers, his two wives, and also his beloved son), he wishes to protect his beloved Africa from war and agrees, especially after his lodge is attacked and destroyed by a band of assassins.

In London, Quatermain meets with the mysterious “M” (Richard Roxburgh), who explains his plan to assemble a modern version of a group of talented individuals known as the “League of Extraordinary Gentlemen”, which aids the world in times of need, in this case to combat the threat of the “Fantom”, who is the true mastermind of the current crisis, and ensure world peace, by stopping him from destroying Venice. Quatermain is introduced to:

The Indian Captain Nemo (Naseeruddin Shah), Commander of the world’s only submersible vessel Nautilus

Invisible gentleman thief Rodney Skinner (Tony Curran), who works for the government in hopes of an antidote for the invisibility serum he stole

The group also recruits the mysterious immortal Dorian Gray (Stuart Townsend) which is the point when Fantom attacks. They managed to fend off his forces with the help of American Secret Service Agent Tom Sawyer (Shane West) who assists the team after the United States finds out about Fantom’s plot.

When it came to Dr. Henry Jekyll (Jason Flemyng), his form of Mr. Hyde has to be hunted down all over Paris by Quatermain and Sawyer before Jekyll offers his services for reprieve in London for his crimes as Hyde.

With the team complete, the group takes off on Nemo’s submarine, the Nautilus, and sets off for Venice. The group worries there is a traitor in their midst when flash powder is found in the wheel room of the Nautilus, and a vial of Jekyll’s transformation serum is determined to be missing. Naturally, all think that the invisible thief, Skinner, is the culprit, but nothing can be done about it since Skinner is nowhere to be found.

Though the group reaches Venice in time, a series of bombs that have been planted under the city start to detonate shortly after, toppling buildings in a domino effect. The team decides that knocking one of the buildings out of the sequence is the only way to stop the chain of explosions. Nemo has a missile that can be fired from the Nautilus at the building in question, but only if a beacon can be set in place. Since Nemo can track his “automobile,” allowing it to serve as the beacon, Sawyer drives the car past the chain of explosions, as Gray and Mina disembark to fight the Fantom’s henchmen. Quatermain, meanwhile, notices and gives chase to the Fantom on foot. During the chase, The Fantom is unmasked and revealed to be M, who then escapes. At the same time, Sawyer crashes the car into the target building, while firing a flare, which signals Nemo to launch his missile. The building is destroyed, the chain of explosions stops, and Venice is saved.

The League regroups at the Nautilus, where Quatermain reveals that M is behind everything. Nemo’s first mate, Ishmael, also reveals that Gray, not Skinner, is the traitor, as he had been mortally shot by Gray, who escapes in an exploration pod. Nemo sets the Nautilus in pursuit, but a record is found from M and Gray, revealing that the League was a ruse so that M could steal physical elements from each of the League members, so as to construct an army of super-powered soldiers:

Captain Nemo’s science and technology

Jekyll’s formula

Mina’s blood

A sample of Skinner’s invisible skin

Quatermain was merely used to capture Hyde. M seeks to profit by starting a world war and selling armaments and weaponry based on the powers of the League to the combatant countries. As the record is played, it also releases a second, high-frequency signal which sets off three bombs in the ship, Dr. Jekyll becomes Mr. Hyde in order to stop the ship from sinking.

Following a signal from Skinner, who had stowed away on Gray’s vessel before he escaped, the Nautilus follows to the Asiatic Arctic, and the League travels to a cave overlooking an industrial fortress. Skinner meets with the group (who then apologizes to him for falsely condemning him as the traitor) there, and tells them that M has a number of scientists and their families held as hostages and slaves in his munitions factory, where the new weapons are being constructed. Splitting up, the League infiltrates the factory. Nemo and Hyde free the scientists and their families; Sawyer and Quatermain go after M. Mina goes in search of Gray, while Skinner sets off to plant some explosives to destroy the factory.

Nemo and Hyde run into M’s second-in-command, Dante (Max Ryan), who drinks a very large dose of Jekyll’s formula and transforms into a gigantic, hulking monster to combat Hyde. Mina fights a stalemate battle with Gray; little is accomplished as they are both immortal, until she confronts him with the enchanted portrait of himself. When he sets eyes upon the painting, he ages rapidly, dies, and decays. Quatermain confronts M in his lair and reveals his deduction that M is none other than the supposedly dead Professor James Moriarty, nemesis of Sherlock Holmes. As the explosives go off, Nemo and Jekyll manage to escape the building through a small hole in the wall, while Dante, being far too large to fit, is crushed to death by falling debris. Quatermain, about to kill Moriarty, sees Sawyer being held at knifepoint and chooses to save Sawyer at the cost of being stabbed himself. Sawyer is forced to use the marksmanship skills that Quatermain had taught him, and manages to kill a fleeing Moriarty before he can leave in his stolen submersible vessel. Quatermain dies soon after, telling Sawyer that the new century belongs to him now–perhaps a prediction of the upcoming century being the “American Century”.

The League assembles in Africa to bury Quatermain. As the group departs, a tribal witch doctor (Semere-Ab Etmet Yohannes) takes handfuls of dirt from Quatermain’s grave and begins a ritual chant. We are reminded of a witch doctor’s pronouncement, recounted by Quatermain at the beginning of the movie, that Africa would not let Quatermain die. As the witch doctor does a chant, the earth shakes violently, making the rifle that Sawyer had left on the grave shake. Lightning strikes the rifle and Quatermain’s grave right before the screen cuts to black.

REVIEW:

This has been one of those oddity weeks for my Netflix choices. In other words, they just picked random films from my list and sent them, even though my tope 3 were available. This is how I ended up with The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, a film that has been on AMC every day for the past month. Now, I’m not complaining about getting this flick. It wasn’t on there for no reason, but I hadn’t planned on watching it this week, at least not in DVD form.

The good…the use of these literary characters as heroes is a nice concept. The action is great. THe look of the Nautilus, both inside and out, is nothing short of remarkable. Sean Connery…need I say more? THe Victorian Era costumes and sets are done very well. Sinking Venice…not that is something that deserves some kudos. Even though the entire city didn’t get sunk, its still a pretty hefty feat, even for what they did.

The bad…apparently, Dorian Gray and Tom Sawyer were not characters in the comic, and were added to the film just because the filmmakers felt like it. I have no issue with Dorain Gray, but Tom Sawyer seemed a bit out of place. My guess is that they wanted to put some American literary hero in, and that’s fine and dandy. I just felt that Tom didn’t quite fit in with the rest, is all. I wasn’t too impressed with the look of Mr. Hyde (or the guy that drinks all the serum at the end). To me they seemed like some kind of hybrid between Hulk and Goro from Mortal Kombat. Not exactly a good combination. On top of that, the transformation scenes were too drawn out. They could have made his transformations be a lot smoother and not so herky jerky. I realize this is 1899, but if the wolfman can have a smooth transformation, then why can’t Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde? They had a really nice story going for Mina, but didn’t go anywhere with it. Obviously, she’s a daywalker, but what else can we know about her? For that matter, what it have hurt to give us some more info about each of the characters? Not everyone sits in a library reading all these books day in and day out ,so they may not be familair with them. I know I had to google Dorian GRay.

This is not a concept that would work for just anyone. Can you imagine characters like The Hardy Boys, Judy Blum, Harry Potter, and those characters that Fabio is when he poses for those smut covers teaming up to save the world? No. That’s what makes this film so great. I’ll admit, though, I didn’t know this was a comic. I need to go see if I can find a copy and then watch this film again. I really enjoyed everything about this picture, though. Critics bashed it (big surprise), saying its only redeeming quality was Sean Connery. Look, as with every film, you need to see it to make your own opinion, but the critics are wrong on this one. This is just a fun action flick featuring literary characters saving the world. do I suggest you take the time to watch it. Well, I’m not going ot say drop everything you’re doing and watch it right now, but yes, you should watch it. Disappoint will not be an option!

The film opens with a mysterious stranger, his face swathed in bandages and his eyes obscured by dark spectacles, taking a room at an inn at the English village of Iping (in Sussex). Never leaving his quarters, the stranger demands that the staff leave him completely alone. However, his dark secret is slowly revealed to his suspicious landlady and the villagers: he is an invisible man. When the innkeeper (Forrester Harvey) and his semi-hysterical wife (Una O’Connor) tell him to leave after he makes a huge mess in the parlor and drives away the other patrons, he tears off the bandages, laughing maniacally, and throws the innkeeper down the stairs. He takes off the rest of his clothes, rendering himself completely invisible, and tries to strangle a police officer.

The invisible stranger is revealed as Dr. Jack Griffin (Claude Rains), a scientist who has discovered the secret of invisibility while conducting a series of tests with a strange new drug called “monocane”. He returns to the laboratory of his mentor, Dr. Cranley (Henry Travers), where he reveals his secret to his fiancee Flora Cranley (Gloria Stuart), Dr. Cranley’s daughter, and to his one-time partner Dr. Kemp (William Harrigan). Monocane has rendered Griffin’s entire body undetectable to the human eye; alas, it also has the side-effect of driving Griffin insane. Cranley has investigated and discovered a single note about monocane (Griffin has burnt all his other papers to cover his tracks) in a now empty cupboard in Griffin’s empty laboratory, and realizes that Griffin has recently used it. On the evening of his escape from the inn, Griffin turns up in Kemp’s living room and imprisons him in his own house. He forces Kemp to be his partner again, and together they go back to the inn where Griffin stayed and retrieve his notebooks on the invisibility process. While there, he picks up a wooden stool and cracks the police officer over the head, killing him.

Kemp calls Cranley, asking for help, and then secretly calls the police. Flora comes to him and they talk for only a minute, until the police show up. Their conversation reveals that the two are completely devoted to each other, and she is as infatuated with him as he her. In Flora’s presence, Griffin becomes more placid, and calls her “darling”. He rants about power, but when he realises Kemp betrayed him to the police through the window, his first reaction is getting Flora to flee, and out of danger. She begs to let her stay, but he says softly, “The only thing you can do is get out of here. Then they can’t hurt you. Go, my darling.” After promising Kemp that at 10:00 PM the next night he will murder him, Griffin escapes again and a reign of terror ensues, the Invisible Man running down the streets killing, robbing, and reciting nursery rhymes in a malicious voice. The police offer a monetary award for anyone who can think of a way to catch the Invisible Man.

They disguise Kemp as a police officer and lead him away from his house to protect him, but Griffin has been following them all along. He forces Kemp into the front seat of his car with his hands tied and releases the emergency brake. The car rolls down a steep hill, over a cliff, and explodes.

Finally, after derailing a train and throwing off a cliff two men who are searching for him with the police as volunteers, Griffin rests in a barn. Alerted by the farmer, the police set fire to the barn. When Griffin comes out, the police sight his footprints in the snow and open fire, mortally wounding him. Griffin is taken to hospital where, on his deathbed, he admits to Flora that he has tampered with a type of science that was meant to be left alone. The effects of the monocane wear off the moment he dies, and he becomes visible once again.

REVIEW:

As a fan of classic cinema, I’ve always been fascinated with the way certain subjects were handled in yesteryear. One such subject would be the effects of showing someone turn invisible.

By today’s standards, of course these graphics are laughable, but in 1933, they were state of the art, or at least close to it. Often time in films like this where objects fly, the tendency is to see the strings that carry them, but, unless my vision failed me or I didn’t see them, there were no strings here. The Invisible Man himself was most impressive in the final scene when he returned to visibility. I was not aware they were capable of such feats back then.

Claude Rains really sells the character. The madness of Dr. Griffin really shows, and grows, as the film progresses. On top of this, Rains really brings out the fact the he thinks he is intellectually superior to everyone, while at the same time allowing the audience to feel pity for him, especially due to his relationship with Flora.

Gloria Stuart is known (or not known) to many as Rose from Titanic. I thought she was just some random old woman they found, but turns out she’s quite the accomplished actress, and is still alive! Here, she doesn’t necessarily have the most screen time, but what little she does have she captivates the audience and is the only one that is able to calm down Dr. Griffin.

It can never be said that movies don’t teach you anything. I had never heard of monocaine before watching this. Granted, it is a totally different chemical than the fictional version used in the film, but it still is something I didn’t know about.

Since I’m trying to familiarize myself with more classic sci-fi/horror films, I figured The Invisible Man would be a good start. I was not mistaken. This film captured my attention from the opening credits to the final scene. As with most classic films, the emphasis is more on the acting rather than the special effects. Something that films of this nature don’t do these days. If you’re in the mood for a classic horror flick with good acting and effects, check this one out.